ᏣᎳᎩᎯ ᎠᏰᎵ ᏗᏕᏠᏆᏍᏙᏗ

SOUNDS REPRESENTED BY VOWELS

a, as a in father, or short as a in rival.

e, as a in plate, or short as e in met.

i, as i in pique, or short as i in pit.

o, as o in note, approaching aw in law.

u, as oo in fool, or short as u in pull.

v, as u in but, nasalized.

CONSONANT SOUNDS

‘g’ is nearly as in English, but approaching ‘k’.

‘d’ nearly as in English, but approaching to t.

‘h,’ ‘k,’ ‘l,’ ‘m,’ ‘n,’ ‘q,’ ‘s,’ ‘t,’ ‘w,’ and ‘y’ as in English.

Variants

It should be noted that some of the characters may have additional sound values which are not included in the chart because there are no words in the dictionary that illustrate these values.

In addition, it should be pointed out that the syllabary spellings in the dictionary are those with which the author Durbin Feeling and those he consulted were most familiar.

The most notable variants Durbin Feeling references are:

• Throughout the dictionary, the characters used to represent the syllables tla, tle, tli, tlo, tlu, and tlv are also used for the syllables hla, hle, hli, hlo, hlu, and hlv.
• The same practice is used for characters that represent sequences of ‘ts’ plus a vowel or ‘j’ plus a vowel, e.g., the syllable Ꮳ can be pronounced as either tsalagi or jalagi.

It is also noted that:

• Syllables beginning with ‘g’ except ‘ga’ have sometimes the power of ‘k’.
• Syllables written with 'tl' except 'tla' may also sometimes vary to 'to', ‘ti’, and ‘tv’.
• Syllables ‘go’, ‘du’, and ‘dv’ are sometimes sounded to ‘dl’.